STB sees up to 16.8m visitor arrivals in 2014

[SINGAPORE] The Singapore Tourism Board (STB) has forecast visitor arrivals to grow to between 16.3 million and 16.8 million this year, and tourism receipts to be in the range of $23.8 billion to $24.6 billion. It also expects companies to remain cautious in their business travel expenditure this year, said Second Minister for Trade and Industry S Iswaran yesterday in Parliament, during the during the Committee of Supply debate on the Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI).

"STB will continue to pursue quality tourism growth, by focusing on visitor experience and driving tourist spend. Given our land and manpower constraints, we need to creatively achieve more with less, and invest in both tourism hardware and software," said Mr Iswaran.

Last year, Singapore welcomed 15.5 million tourists, 7 per cent more than in 2012. They spent $23.5 billion, 2 per cent more than the year before.